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The Truth About Cars is dedicated to providing candid, unbiased automobile reviews and the latest in auto industry news.Sat, 21 Mar 2015 15:31:55 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.0.1The Truth About Cars is dedicated to providing candid, unbiased automobile reviews and the latest in auto industry news.The Truth About CarsnoThe Truth About Carseditors@ttac.comeditors@ttac.com (The Truth About Cars)2006-2009The Truth About CarsThe Truth About Cars is dedicated to providing candid, unbiased automobile reviews and the latest in auto industry news.The Truth About Cars » defunct brandshttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/themes/ttac-theme/images/logo.gifhttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com
Question Of The Day : What If You Could Resurrect A Dying Or Dead Brand?http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2014/05/question-of-the-day-what-if-you-could-resurrect-a-dying-or-dead-brand/
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2014/05/question-of-the-day-what-if-you-could-resurrect-a-dying-or-dead-brand/#commentsTue, 06 May 2014 16:21:57 +0000http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=816065I made my first small fortune in this business selling old Volvos. I started way back in the mid-2000‘s when I got downright militant about outbidding anyone on an older rear-wheel drive Volvo. In one year, 2007 to be exact, I managed to buy at least one Volvo every year from 1983 all the way […]

I started way back in the mid-2000‘s when I got downright militant about outbidding anyone on an older rear-wheel drive Volvo. In one year, 2007 to be exact, I managed to buy at least one Volvo every year from 1983 all the way to 2004.

I loved the Volvo brand as their rear wheel drive cars represented the perfect mix of comfort, safety and functionality. The discontinued 240, 740 and 940 were insanely easy to sell and cheap to buy; especially the wagons.

These Volvos usually had a history of conservative owners who took their cars to the dealership or Volvo specialized shops for service. Repairs were easy and reasonable thanks to long model runs and parts that were as common as kudzu at any Georgia junkyard.

The used car side of the Volvo brand represented a big fat target where young families, hipsters, Camry-oriented shoppers, and the still common Brick enthusiast could all find a Volvo worth keeping. I followed that tune of demand and soon became a daily reader at Brickboard, Swedespeed, and several other well known sites for Volvo aficionados. I was hooked.

Then I became unhooked.

The seeds of Volvo’s destruction started out as an opportunity for me. Owners began to trade in Volvo S70’s and V70’s from 99′ upwards due to a malfunctioning electronic throttle module. At the sales I would see these vehicles being sold AS/IS, buy them ridiculously cheap, and then take them to the Volvo dealer to get their software upgrade. Eventually Volvo did the right thing by extending the coverage to 10 years and 200,000 miles. However, as Volvos began to develop other issues such as lifetime fluids that weren’t so, and parts failures that were as cheaply made as they were expensive to fix at the dealerships, the marketability of these vehicles nosedived to the point of near irrelevance.

The Volvo S40 was a world-class blunder. The Volvo S60 and S80 were left to rot on the vine of Ford’s neglect along with the V70 and C70. The Volvo XC90 may have represented the brand’s only solid hit for the entire decade as the MBA marketeers at the Premier Automotive Group decided to make Volvo into a downright ridiculous alternative to BMW.

Volvo wasn’t alone in the quixotic pursuit for a more ‘upscale’ brand identity. Oldsmobile was positioned as an import fighter. Mercury tried to become a premium brand as well, and marketed heavily towards women, while Lincoln redefined American luxury in a way that no one outside of Dearborn could quite understand.

The list of failed brands stretches long since the Y2K era. Plymouth. Isuzu. Saturn. Hummer. As proof of their deadness in the retail marketplace, most independent dealerships that specialize in financing won’t even buy these brands… along with Volvo, Mercury and Lincoln.

You can’t sell a dead brand, unless you were maybe a successful overseas manufacturer trying to crack the American market. Or maybe the CEO of Ford or GM. Let’s assume that the perfect world exists. A place where you could choose your brand and launch your products without worrying about money. Consider yourself old GM, a newbie at Tesla, whatever you like.

]]>http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2014/05/question-of-the-day-what-if-you-could-resurrect-a-dying-or-dead-brand/feed/265Question Of The Day: What Is The Best Orphan Car In History?http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2012/11/question-of-the-day-what-is-the-best-orphan-car-in-history/
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2012/11/question-of-the-day-what-is-the-best-orphan-car-in-history/#commentsMon, 12 Nov 2012 14:00:58 +0000http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=466565 There was the Cadillac of minivans. A different kind of company selling a different kind of car. A Swede with no compromises, and a Frenchman that went from strength to strength. Daihatsus that were perhaps, a bit too modest, by skinny dipping their unknown name in a slogan-less lake. And then we had that crazy distant Yugoslavian […]

There was the Cadillac of minivans. A different kind of company selling a different kind of car. A Swede with no compromises, and a Frenchman that went from strength to strength.

Daihatsus that were perhaps, a bit too modest, by skinny dipping their unknown name in a slogan-less lake. And then we had that crazy distant Yugoslavian cousin who bragged about a ‘road back to sanity’ while his neighbors blew up his plant.

They are gone now from these shores, for now. As is Opel, Hummer, Mercury, Plymouth, and in due time, Suzuki. An amazing variety of brands that offered their own interesting contributions to the mosaic of the American automotive experience.

Rockys and Rodeos were rugged for too short of a while. While Hummer alternated between playing the role of the military bad-ass and the fashionista poseur. Eventually style won, followed by bankruptcy.

Europeans always offered a more sophisticated level of style while battling Gremlins on every level. While weaker Japanese marques, plainly, contributed varying levels of utility and engineering excellence to a marketplace that expected far more.

Then there is Oldsmobile.

Oldsmobile, the rocket division, was the power and the glory. From their 300+ horsepower cruisers of the late-60’s to the best selling Cutlass Supremes of the mid-80’s. It’s hard to find fault with a popular brand like Oldsmobile that was torturously mis-marketed and blandified into irrelevance.

All defunct brands have their unique qualities. But which vintage offered the very best? Which model among them all provided that level of power and prestige that begs for a resurrection of the brand?

Any constraints on choices? Well… no outright luxury or exotic brands. Vectors, Deusenbergs, Cords and Tuckers may have their place in museuems the world over. But for this particular exercise I want special attention to be given to those models that served the everyday Joe.

Choose your car wisely, and defend it well. Hell hath no Fury like a Plymouth.

]]>http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2012/11/question-of-the-day-what-is-the-best-orphan-car-in-history/feed/69Pontiac Is Still Deadhttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2009/11/pontiac-is-still-dead/
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2009/11/pontiac-is-still-dead/#commentsThu, 26 Nov 2009 01:11:44 +0000http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=337057Pontiac was declared “officially almost all the way dead” at about 12:45 p.m. today, when a white, G6 sedan rolled off the assembly line in Orion Township. The Detroit News reports a distinct lack of “cake or commemorative banner or senior GM official on hand.” Media was not invited. The DetN notes: Unlike the last […]

Pontiac was declared “officially almost all the way dead” at about 12:45 p.m. today, when a white, G6 sedan rolled off the assembly line in Orion Township. The Detroit News reports a distinct lack of “cake or commemorative banner or senior GM official on hand.” Media was not invited. The DetN notes:

Unlike the last Oldsmobile, an Alero signed by hundreds of plant workers and donated to the R.E. Olds Transportation Museum in Lansing, the final G6 models will be sold as part of a fleet order.

Nearly unbelievably, Pontiac’s “officially official” demise will be even more depressing: a Mexico-built G3 Wave (neé Aveo) to be sold to a lucky Canadian. For real.